Get There: (Originally Published in the Print Anthology a RED HOT VALENTINE'S DAY) Read online

  “You’re still dressed,” she said with a shake of her head. “That won’t do at all.”

  Together they undressed him. His clothes mingled with hers in the pile the way their bodies would soon join in the flesh. Naked, Edie stood between Ty’s thighs and looked down at his body, so lean and finely muscled.

  His penis begged for her hand. When she curled her fingers around his length, not yet as familiar as his mouth, he let out a low, whispering sigh that sent thrills all through her. This is what it means to be a woman, she thought. This is what it means to be a wife.

  With his hands on the backs of her thighs and her hand on his shoulder, she stroked him and watched, fascinated at the way his skin flushed. She twisted her hand around the head of his erection, and he jerked under her touch.

  This is power, she thought. This is love.

  “I need to taste you,” Ty said. She bent to give him what he wanted, but though he kissed her mouth, Ty shook his head. “Not that way.”

  When he laid her back on the narrow bed and parted her thighs, Edie had to close her eyes. When his mouth slid over her body, teasing her nipples and wetting her belly, she arched into the touch of hands and mouth. And finally, when Ty kissed her there she let out a long, slow cry of desire.

  His tongue moved against her flesh, circling in a way that had her lifting her hips within seconds. Edie wanted to cry out at the sound of his breathing, so loud even above the noise of the train on the tracks.

  She did, unable to keep her ecstasy silent when Ty slid a finger inside her. Then another, stretching her deliciously. Her hips rocked upward to his feasting mouth. Tension spiraled in her belly, her thighs twitching as Ty’s tongue and fingers moved in tandem with the train’s rocking.

  Edie cupped her breasts, found her nipples and rolled them. Ty’s hair, too short for fashion, was barely long enough to tickle her thighs and belly as he licked and suckled. He added a third finger and the first spasm of pleasure shook her.

  She cried out his name and he eased off. He moved up her body, replacing his tongue with a fingertip but keeping up the same maddening pressure. He reached between them to guide himself inside her welcoming body. He paused, his penis just inside her, and took long, slow breaths.

  Edie shifted and hooked her ankles over the backs of his calves. “Make love to me, Ty.”

  “Give me a second, honey.” Ty kissed her, hard, his mouth tangy from her arousal. “I don’t want to go off like a cannon first thing.”

  She laughed softly, surprised she could when desire had stolen nearly every other reaction. She held his rear tightly and urged him forward. He opened her with his body, each delicious and indescribable inch. She gasped into his kiss and he took her breath, then gave it back with his moan.

  “I can’t wait,” she said against his mouth.

  Ty pushed forward and seated himself inside her. He bent his face into the curve of her shoulder. He trembled, and Edie stroked her hands down his back, holding him tight to her.

  The spirals of tension had faded a bit, but when he moved, they flared again. Bright sparkles of pleasure radiated throughout her entire body as Ty thrust. Pleasure mounted. He moved faster at her urging.

  The train rocked them together. Ty moved in her slickness and her heat, and he filled her completely. Edie brought his mouth to hers, and kissing him, she burst the first time.

  As her body bore down on his, Ty said her name over and over. His hips pushed forward. He slid his arms beneath her to hold her closer as the bed rattled beneath them, and Edie no longer could tell or cared if it were the train or their bodies making it shake.

  Ty slid a hand between them, his fingers pressing each time he thrust, and pleasure, unexpected, built again. Her fingers clutched his back, scratching, but Ty only moaned and moved faster. Harder.

  He shuddered and thrust once more, collapsing on top of her just as Edie exploded into another climax.

  The train rocked them both to sleep after that, and when Edie awoke, the first bright pink strands of morning streaked by the window outside. Ty sat in one of the chairs by the window. He’d been watching her.

  “Another hour or so,” he said quietly, “until we get there.”

  Edie sat without caring the blankets had bunched around her waist. The bed hadn’t been too small, after all. She reached for him and he came to her. They made love slowly and in silence, mindful they had only so much time.

  Later, as the train slowed and prepared to stop, he pulled the box from his pocket. “This is why I was late. It’s not much, I know, but—”

  Edie kissed him into silence, and she put the ring on her finger. It was more than she’d expected. “It’s beautiful.”

  “I wanted you to have one for the wedding, but—”

  “It’s enough I have it now.” She didn’t ask him how he’d afforded it. She didn’t tell him a diamond chip on a band of gold wouldn’t replace him beside her. She just kissed him again and again until the train pulled into the station and it was time for them to go.

  “How about this one? Can I have this one, too?” Ham held up an early-’80s issue of Pandaman.

  Ty, hands full of slippery comics trying to slither from his grasp before he could wrestle them into the packing box, looked up. “You want that one? Why?”

  “Some of your best work,” Ham said seriously, flipping the pages. “Totally underrated. Worth a mint someday. Trying to get in on the ground floor.”

  Ty laughed. “Right. Fine, take it. One less thing I have to pack.”

  Pandaman had been his freshman foray into the world of independent comics. A critical but not financial success, he’d managed to put out only a dozen issues before the small press that’d taken a chance on him had folded. It was possible, Ty supposed, that those issues might be worth more than a buck or two someday, but hell. His parents probably had a few boxes of them in the garage.

  Ham set it in the box of stuff he was liberating as part of his “fee” for helping Ty pack for the move. He looked around the living room, mostly bare now. He shook his head.

  “What?” Ty stretched, all his joints popping in protest at kneeling for so long.

  “You sure about this, man?” Ham, self-proclaimed bachelor-for-life, said. “Really sure?”

  “Do I have to punch you?”

  Ham laughed. “Don’t get me wrong. Edie’s a great girl, but–”

  “She’s a woman,” Ty interrupted. “Maybe if you went out with a woman instead of a girl once in a while, you’d understand.”

  “Touché, mon frére.” Ham couldn’t keep his look of pretended hurt for long. “Seriously, I’m happy for you. I just wish like hell she lived in Maine. Or would move here, so you didn’t have to move to Bumfuck, Pennsylvania.”

  Ty used the tape gun on the box he’d filled. “Could be worse. I could be moving all the way to California.”

  “Now that wouldn’t be so bad.” Ham grinned. “I could visit in L.A. You could introduce me to all the starlets.”

  “In your dreams, buddy.”

  Ham shook his head again. “I’m just saying.”

  Ty held out the tape gun. “Less talking. More packing.”

  Later, after a few beers, some ordered-in hot wings and a hockey game on the tube, Ham had finally gone home. Ty, glad for the help and the company, had nonetheless been glad for his friend to go.

  The time difference meant Edie would just be getting home from work. Some days, like him, she worked from her apartment, but with finishing the final season and the move, she’d been spending more days in the office.

  Already grinning with anticipation, Ty slid into his desk chair and clicked open his e-mail and instant message programs. A small box popped up immediately: “ontherun327 is offline.” It was the same screen name she’d used forever on the Runner message boards, and it never failed to make him smile.

  She’d sent him an e-mail saying she’d been invited out after work for a going-away party with the postproduction crew. She’d ping him wh
en she got home, if he could stay awake that long. Ty couldn’t blame her for going, but he did miss her. She’d left him something else, too: a story about a train that got him hard and a prompt of his own.

  We could get there by magic carpet.

  Ty laughed aloud at that and sat back in his chair, spinning it while he thought. She was paying him back, was she? He’d thought a train was easy, and from the story she’d sent him, it didn’t look as though Edie’d had any trouble writing it. But then, she never did. It was one of the first things he’d learned about her–give her any scenario and she could come up with something. He, on the other hand, was better with pictures to illustrate his words.

  Well. He’d just have to see what he could do.

  It’s woven of threads in many colors. Blue, black, green. Red. A hint of yellow, like sunshine, that reminds me of the scarf you wore the first time we met. It’s a rug, really, not a carpet, but it’s big enough for two, and that’s all that matters.

  I know the words to make it rise and fly, but I haven’t used them yet. I’m waiting until we’ve both stepped on. When we’re both ready to go.

  When I lay you down on the soft threads, your hair spreads out like part of the design. It weaves into the vines and flowers, those living, growing things. You make them beautiful.

  Naked, your skin is softer even than the woven silk. The carpet cradles us, silk on skin. Skin on silk. And then, when I’ve covered your body with mine, I say the words.

  And we go up.

  The sky isn’t bluer than your eyes, the breeze not sweeter than your breath. The sun shines warm and yellow on my back, but it’s not nearly as hot as your kiss.

  I kiss you. I touch you. I taste every part of you, there in the sky with a carpet of silk beneath us, carrying us to the place we’ll be able to stay together. Always.

  “Always.”

  Edie echoed the last word of Ty’s letter as she clicked the printer icon.

  She’d missed him last night, gotten home too late for him to wait, but this morning when she’d checked her e-mail she’d found this. It wasn’t as lovely as one of his handwritten notes or drawings, but she wanted to save it forever with the others. The printer whirred into life, spitting out the document. She read over it again at her desk, while outside her office the murmur and mumble of people passing tried rudely to remind her she was at work and wasn’t supposed to be reading love letters.

  “Knock-knock.”

  The rap on the doorframe drew her attention and she looked up. “Hey, Billy.”

  With a grin, Billy lifted a pizza box. “I brought a pizza.”

  Edie gestured for him to come in. “I’m starving. How’d you know?”

  “I know how you get when you’re concentrating, sweetie. I figured if someone didn’t bring you sustenance, you would starve.” Billy set the pizza on the edge of the desk and looked around her stripped-to-the-essentials office. “Wow. You’re really going.”

  Edie looked at the blank walls, where once she’d hung framed promotional posters for the show and awards she’d won. All packed up and shipped off already. “I’m really going.”

  “Seems like just yesterday you were ordering me to bring you coffee,” Billy said in a faux-nostalgic voice, with a flutter of his lashes. Billy had started as her intern and moved up to assistant before nabbing a place on the writing team. He knew her better than anyone else, other than Ty. “Now look. You’re abandoning me.”

  Edie stood and gave Billy a squeeze. She drew in the delicious scent of sauce and cheese. “Mmmm, what am I going to do without you?”

  “Be taken care of by another handsome man,” Billy said matter-of-factly. “Ty will be happy to make sure you’re fed and clothed appropriately, I’m sure. Pennsylvania gets cold you know, sweetie. No running out for the mail in your tank top and shorts in February. Hell, no sitting in your living room in a tank top and shorts in February.”

  Edie looked down at her outfit, a tank top and cutoff jeans. The Runner office, unless they had some press function to attend, was always casual. “I guess not.”

  “Ty will keep you warm.” Billy grinned and wiggled his brows. “But damn, sugar, I’m going to miss you.”

  She squeezed his arm. “Me, too. But you’ll visit. And I’ll be back out here for meetings once in a while, I’m sure.”

  Billy grabbed a slice and bit into it with a sigh of pleasure. “You couldn’t pay me enough to move all the way across the country.”

  “I’m not doing it for the money, Billy.” Leaning on the edge of her desk, Edie took her own slice and sighed with satisfaction at the first bite.

  He used his thumb on the corner of her mouth to clear away an errant glob of sauce. “I know, sweetie. You’re doing it for the fabulous mind-blowing sex.”

  Edie’s laugh hurt a little bit at the sight of her dear Billy’s face. “That’s part of it. But I’m going to miss you, too. You know that.”

  He grabbed her hand and squeezed. “You’d better. And you’d better write me a Pulitzer.”

  “Somehow I doubt any of the Runner novels are going to hit the New York Times’s best-seller list, much less win a Pulitzer, but I’ll see what I can do.” She paused, thinking of how different it would be, working on a new show, in a new city. “Anyway, we’ll see if they even contract any new books.”

  “Honey, this is the show that wouldn’t die. You know they’re going to want movies and books and comics.”

  “Doesn’t mean I’ll be the one they ask to write them.”

  “Worried?”

  Edie bent to hook open the dorm-sized fridge where she kept her stash of diet sodas. She handed him one, then cracked the top of hers and drank before answering. “Maybe.”

  “About what? The work? The new show?” Billy wiped his fingers with a paper napkin and tossed it into the trash before snagging another slice that wouldn’t dare add a fraction of an inch to his lean frame.

  Edie nodded, sipping.

  “Ty?”

  After a minute, she nodded again.

  Billy chewed and swallowed, then put down the pizza to gather her into his arms for a full-on, full-frontal, patented Billy hug. “You can write circles around every other hack out there, honey.”

  Edie leaned against him for a minute, then pulled away with a sigh. “Tell me something. Do you think I’m doing the right thing?”

  Billy laughed. “Honey. I don’t think you could do anything else. You’re crazy about that man. And he’s absolutely head over heels for you.”

  “Yeah, I know.” Warmth flooded her at the thought, countered only with regret he wasn’t going, too. “I’m sorry you can’t come.”

  “I’m not. I’m not made for the cold.” Billy shuddered. “Besides, I’ve still got a job and I have dibs on your office here. Sure, it won’t be the same as working on Runner, but Distant Shores is a good show, too.”

  “It will be even better once you’re on staff.”

  “Flattery will get you everywhere.” Billy grabbed up his pizza again, folding the slice in half to fit it into his grin.

  They finished the pizza and drinks, but then it was back to the grindstone. Edie had only two more episodes to finish before the move, but they were for the finale, and had been giving her fits. The show’s fifth and final season had to end in a way that would satisfy the fans while tying up the final threads of the story arc the writers had built over the past two seasons and setting the show up for the anticipated movies.

  Piece of cake.

  Two hours later, it was stale cake with sour icing.

  Edie sighed and pushed back in her chair, rubbing at the small of her back to ease the ache from sitting hunched over for too long. Her eyes burned from staring at the computer screen. Hell, even her fingertips hurt from pounding away at the keys.

  Twilight was still toying with the sky when she forced herself to shut down the computer and head home, though she knew she had another few hours of work waiting there. That was the life of a writer, and one she lov
ed, but, oh, how nice it would be when she could come home to Ty instead of an empty apartment and an e-mail message!

  It would be late for him, and she didn’t blame him for not waiting up for her, but Edie couldn’t hold back the sigh of disappointment when she logged in and found an e-mail from him instead of a bouncing instant message icon signifying he was online and ready to talk to her.

  Only another week. One more week. She could last a week, couldn’t she?

  Babe. Lots to do tomorrow morning (potential buyers coming to look at the house in the a.m.). Going to bed now. Love you. T

  She sighed again. She’d been able to get out of her lease without much complication, but Ty was having a harder time selling his house. “Good night, Ty,” she said.

  P.S., she read. We could get there by rocket ship.

  “All systems in lockdown, Captain.” Commander Murphy waved toward the control console, where all the lights had gone green.

  “The crew, too?” Captain Darowish turned from the console to stare at her first mate, hard. “I don’t want any accidents, Murphy. Not like what happened to the Delta crew.”

  The Delta crew hadn’t been in full sleep when the ship went through the Surge. They all lived. It would have been better if they’d died.

  Murphy faced her, his deep green eyes glinting in the light from the console. Clad in his regulation black sleep suit, his honed body looked slight, even weak. But Darowish knew from experience there wasn’t a damn weak thing about Tynan Murphy, and there was no other man she’d rather have at her back. Or her front, she mused, watching as Murphy gave a last-minute inspection of the controls.

  Once upon a time she’d had him there, and as often as she’d wanted. She’d thrown it all away then, and there was no use wishing for it now. No matter if this was the last half hour she’d ever remember.

  “We’re clear,” Murphy said.

  It wasn’t his job to do this. Under normal circumstances, the ship’s engineer would have overseen putting the ship in lockdown, while the medical officer would have taken care of the crew. But the Gamma had lost her engineer and four other fine crewmen to a midspace virus brought in by one of the survey teams. A virus couldn’t jettison half their cargo or sabotage the ship’s water and food supplies, but infected crewmen could, and had. The infected, driven to madness by the virus acting on the hypothalamus, had also damaged the android medical officer beyond repair.